Story highlights

MME sits down with George Whitesides, president and CEO of Virgin Galactic

IN FOCUS: Abu Dhabi's aerospace ambitions

The Middle East is fast becoming a major hub for air travel and aviation technology. Recently the world's leading aircraft companies gathered in Abu Dhabi for the Global Aerospace Summit. At the summit, Strata, a division of Abu Dhabi's development fund, Mubadala, unveiled a $1 billion deal with Boeing to build airplane parts of carbon composite. MME spends a day on the factory floor.

FACETIME: George Whitesides, President & CEO, Virgin Galactic

This week marked the final voyage of the space shuttle and it was to a museum. The United States retired its space shuttles last year due to a lack of funding. Now, the private sector has stepped into space exploration. Virgin Galactic was one of the first and for a price tag of $200,000, you could be on your way to space. MME sits down with the man behind the out-of-this-world experience, George Whitesides.